The Blood of the Breeze
by theradioactivefangirl
Summary: Brianna has a dark secret. Brianna/Sam. Rated M for self-harm.
1. Chapter 1

Brianna leant against the tree and sunk dejectedly into a sitting position. She surveyed the area around her to make sure nobody was watching. They weren't. And then she got out her machete. _Just one _she mentally promised herself, knowing full well that she didn't mean it. She drew it across her exposed forearm and watched, entranced, as the tiny blood droplets began to form at the surface of her skin. _Bliss._ She wanted more. She wanted to slice open her arm again and again until there was no blood left to bleed. It was instinct. An escape from the harsh reality of her life.

Before she knew it, there wasn't even a square millimetre of non-bloodied skin on her arm. There were cuts, which she knew she could easily hide here in the FAYZ, with so many dangers. But the words... she couldn't pass them off as whip lashes or battle wounds. Now she could think clearly, her mind not clouded by pent up agony, she gazed at them. _Fat. Ugly. Bitch. Worthless. _All of these featured, written in jagged capitals. They oozed crimson. And they stung like hell. She didn't regret it.

A voice sounded not far away from her. "Brianna? Is that you?" Sam. _Shit! _ She pulled down her sleeve as fast as she could manage and winced as it brushed against the fresh cuts. She still didn't answer, as she could sense Sam's presence behind her. She had been just in time. "Hey!" he sounded relieved, not irritated or worried thank God.

Forcing a smile, she got to her feet "Hi Sam! What brings you looking for me? Do I get to kill Drake?"

"Well, actually... I wanted company" he said sheepishly. Looking at his scuffed shoes. _Company? From _her_? Why?_

"Um, kay. What d'ya wanna do then?"

"I don't mind. Let's walk back to the lake and then we'll have a think" then, seeing the glint in Brianna's eye, added "_walk. _I am _not _going to race you Brianna."

"It wouldn't be much of a race, it would just be The Breeze totally thrashing you." she retorted, making Sam chuckle. _Cute_.

They set off walking, making conversation about the pre-FAYZ days and laughing about how much they actually missed school now it was gone. It made her happy. When she was with Sam she forgot her worldly problems. She wished she could be with him more. Sam made some sort of joke about how many pairs of trainers she went through and she punched him playfully, providing the starting blow for a play-fight. They shoved each other, laughing, into the undergrowth and ended up in a tangled heap on the forest floor. Brianna sat up and leaned over Sam, grinning mischievously, "you know how _weird_ we must look right now?"

"We must look like we're about to fuck or something, when in reality you're about to torture me!" he laughed.

She brushed a lock of red hair out of her face, carelessly allowing her sleeve to fall down. Noticing this almost immediately, she had pulled it back up in less than a second; but not before Sam saw a flash of red.

"Breeze... What was that on your wrist?" asked Sam. His face could have been the dictionary definition of concern. He stood up and so did she.

"What?" Brianna's face reddened and she tried to think of a way to get out of this situation. She wished the ground could swallow her up. "Oh... I caught my arm on a branch earlier, it's fine."

"Let me take a look, from what I could see it certainly didn't look fine."

Her mind was in complete overload- Sam could _not_ find out. _No. _"Seriously, it's barely a scratch! You don't need to look at it! I'm fine and you have more important things to do."

He took her arm in his strong hand "Please." His beautiful eyes gazing at her. She ceased her struggling. He carefully inched the sleeve up her arm. She looked at the floor in shame as her darkest secret was unveiled. There were tears forming in her tired eyes.

"Brianna..." Sam whispered. "Why?"


	2. Chapter 2

**Note: In this story, Astrid doesn't exist- that's why Sam and Brianna can be happily shipped :)**

Brianna's voice was small and strangled when she tried to speak, 'I... I... I'm sorry.' she squeaked before zooming off into the distance.

Sam's brain was having trouble registering this information. How could Brianna, of all people, cut herself? What was so bad that she had to resort to hurting herself? Happy, cheery Brianna, who could find humour in the most dreadful situations, who he thought of as more than a sister. It was all a façade to mask the darkness inside. How could this be true? She was the last person he would have expected to do this. It couldn't be true. But it was. He should leave her to calm down, but he knew he had to talk to her before consulting anyone else- she evidently and understandably wanted this kept private.

Dusting off his old jacket, he stood up and began to jog back to the lake. It was a good 30 minutes away for him, but Brianna could've arrived by now if she'd gone that way (though Sam doubted that she had).

As it turned out, Brianna did go straight back to the lake; but no one noticed her because she blurred past too quickly and quietly for their unsuspecting selves to notice. When she sat down on the edge of her bed, she could feel the blood pumping through her arm. And out of it, for that matter. Carefully, she wiped away the blood with a damp cloth and got out a bandage, which (heedless of their short supply) Brianna had found and kept when she was checking out houses for food. She felt sick to her stomach.

_Sam. Knew._

Oh God. Sam knew. He would surely hate her. _And _he would tell Dekka! And then Dekka would hate her. _Great._ She groaned. _Why couldn't she have just been more discreet? Why did she have to let her guard down? Why was she such a pathetic mess? Why couldn't she just _die _already? _She needed an escape more desperately than ever, and the damage was already done. It's not like this could make it worse. She thrust her left wrist forward in front of her so she could see it with her red, puffy eyes. Then she removed the blade from her pocket and slashed madly at the pale skin. The red relief poured in waterfalls from the many engravings. It looked beautiful. She sighed in happiness at the temporary relinquishing of the mental agony. But it was short lived. Within an hour both of her arms were more cuts than skin and her thighs looked like someone had tried to give her tiger stripes. She bandaged both arms, however she figured that she could easily keep her thighs covered.

At dinner, Brianna sat with Jack and Dekka, taking extra care to keep as much distance between her and one Sam Temple as possible. Luckily, they did not question it. She tried to engage in the polite chit chat, but her brain was buzzing with terror. Several times, she caught Sam staring intently at her, a hurt expression clouding his blue eyes. Once, she dared to hold his gaze and the unspoken words between them told her that he wasn't going to leave this. She made a mental note to prepare answers in her head for the questions he was likely to bombard her with.


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: I don't really have much of a plan for this story, so you're welcome to give me ideas if you have them ****۟ **

Brianna managed to successfully avoid Sam for the next few days, but she would have been stupid to think she could keep it up. Late one evening, as she sat in her cabin reading (a habit which she, being Brianna, had not intended to take up but had somehow become immersed in), there was a knock on the door.

'Who's there?' she called.

'It's me- Sam.'

'I thought as much. What do I have to do to _not _have this conversation?'

'There's nothing. I'm coming in.' and with that, the door was pushed open and Sam crossed the threshold, gently shutting the door. Worry and sadness were etched upon his handsome face, marring the tanned skin. It hurt to know that she had been the cause of it. She opened her mouth to give some pathetic excuse for leaving, but he interrupted her. 'You can't pretend this never happened forever. Sooner or later, we're going to have to talk about this and the longer you leave it the worse it's going to be when you finally get there.'

'Do you hate me?' she let out. _Fuck. She hadn't meant to say that! _It had just been on her mind and for some stupid reason she couldn't hold it in. Just _typical_.

There was an awkward silence, which in reality lasted about 10 seconds but gave Brianna the chance to rethink her entire 13 years of existence, then Sam said 'Hate you? Why on Earth would I hate you?'

Brianna pulled up her sleeves in answer, revealing the now closed up wounds that she had so obviously inflicted upon herself, 'Because I'm weak, and you probably consider me some kind of freaky weirdo now.'

'I don't think the boy who shoots light out of his hands can really call people a freak. And you're definitely not weak. I don't hate you at all! I don't feel any less amiable towards you.' he continued, 'Now let me ask the questions. Why do you do this to yourself?'

She thought. Racked her brains for a reason that (a) stood out above the rest, and (b) wasn't too mind torturing to tell. 'There are lots of reasons. I guess because I'm not good enough mainly.'

'How the _hell_ aren't you good enough? And for whom?'

'Well I'm stupid, annoying, ugly, fat, mean, pathetic and completely worthless. All I can do is run and that's not even a real talent, just a freaky mutation. As for the second one... I guess I'm not good enough for myself, other people, I was never good enough for my family or my school and... I'm not good enough for _you_.'

'You are none of those things and you are good enough for all those people, especially me. You're by no means perfect- that's impossible, but I love you and your flaws, they make you individual. _You're perfect to me_.'

For a moment, she was lost in the calm sapphire seas of his eyes, hypnotised by their intense gaze, the world around her non-existent as she sank deeper into the pure blue. She pulled herself out of the trance to thank him, but found herself instead unable to speak, silent tears cascading from her unblinking eyes. He enfolded her into a hug; allowing her to silently weep into his shirt whilst he smoothed her unruly red hair and uttered soothing words. When the sobs subsided, they just half sat, half lay there, side by side, her head resting on his chest.

For the first time in months, Brianna was happy when she finally drifted off to sleep.


	4. Chapter 4

**Hey :) I've got no idea where I'm going with this but oh well... I'm thinking of putting an eating disorder into later chapters as it is commonly coupled with depression (in my personal experience and that of many people I've seen online), what do you think?**

That morning when Brianna awoke Sam was sitting at her desk, holding a piece of paper covered with his sprawling handwriting. After asking her how she was and giving her time to rouse her tired brain, he made it perfectly clear to her that the questioning wasn't finished. 'What did you do it with?' he asked bluntly, in a tone reminiscent of his twin brother Caine's. He was reading from the paper in his hand, which she now realised was a list of yet more questions that he had compiled. She knew better than to resist and dragged herself out of bed, signalling for him to wait as she made her way over to the drawer and opened it. After rummaging for a few seconds, she found what she was looking for. Gulping, she turned round and spread out her blade collection on the cabin floor. She watched Sam stare in utter disbelief at the sight before him- tiny pins and sharpener blades lay beside massive industrial blades, all sorts of kitchen tools, shards of glass and even a tiny red lighter. Then his eyes came to rest upon the pride of her collection- the gleaming machete saved only for the worst type of mental pain. 'Breeze...' he whispered, 'This is... This is awful.'

'I know.' she tried to act impartial, but she was fighting back tears. _No. She was _not _going to cry. _

'How long have you been doing this?' Sam returned to the questions, understanding that she did not really feel up to elaborating.

'Since my Mom and step-dad sent me to Coates, maybe 3 years ago. I just felt so sad that they sent me away to a school for _problem _kids, _rejects_! And then I realised that maybe I _was _a reject- they got my twin step brothers so all of a sudden they don't _need _my Mom's annoying daughter. After all, all I ever did was hinder my Mom's relationship with my step-dad, he had to work to feed some kid who didn't even like him. It made me feel so _worthless_. And then I decided that anger and agony are better than misery- so I hated them for sending me to Coates and cut myself to release the misery that I'd built up inside.'

Evidently surprised by the rush of emotion and bitterness, he faltered before asking the next question. 'Does Dekka know?'

'No. And she can't. I swear to God if you tell her I'll kill you!' Brianna retorted sharply, panicking for a moment.

'Okay. Can I tell Edilio? He's good with upset people and stress.'

She considered this. Edilio was nice and he could keep a secret... 'Fine. But if he tells anyone-'

'You'll kill me?' he cut her off.

'How _did _you know?' she laughed.

Sam grinned. 'Just my intuition. Nothing to do with the fact that you make a lot of death threats _at all!_' when she giggled, he continued, back serious 'I'm off to talk to Edilio then, coming?' she shook her head, knowing that she couldn't handle talking to two people at once about this; she found it excessively difficult to talk to Sam and he was one of her best friends so she was right to presume that talking to Sam _and _Edilio would be bad for her.

When Sam left, Brianna changed her clothes out of her comfortable evening clothes. She wasn't worried about fashion – no one in the FAYZ was worried about something so trivial any more – but she did like to look presentable. She donned a snug black tee shirt, accompanied by black leggings. Her feet were the only colourful part of her outfit- neon yellow Nike trainers (her third pair this month as one of the unfortunate side effects of high speed running involved the rapid shredding of her shoes). Then she left the cabin and began her morning jog.


	5. Chapter 5

**Another chapter. Sorry if it took longer than usual- I have had school and all that boring stuff, but I am trying to work on it whenever I can.**

Edilio was sat at the edge of the lake, seemingly entranced by the smooth, still water shimmering in the early morning sun when Sam approached. 'Hey' came a tentative voice from behind him.

'Hey, man. What's up?' Edilio replied cheerily, for today he was in a good mood- nothing was particularly wrong in the FAYZ for once and he didn't have to attend to upset, hungry or grieving kids left right and centre. _Perfect._

'Oh. That's the thing. There's something I have to tell you.'

_Just one day! Was that not possible? Could he not have _one _day where there were no problems?!_ Filled with trepidation, Edilio forced an interested expression and asked 'What?'

'Dude, it's Brianna.'

_The Breeze? But he had seen her just last night at dinner! _'What about her?' he questioned, truly curious now.

'She... she has been... she's been cutting herself.'

After her jog, Brianna sat down on a rock in the middle of a clearing, unable to stop worrying. Running always made her feel good, it was straightforward and she knew exactly what she had to do, just how she liked things, but even running could not calm the fear she felt deep down in the pit of her empty stomach. What would Edilio think? What would he _do? _She dreaded going back to the lake and facing her fears. Instinctively, she raked her nails down her arm, leaving long white scratches. Ugh. There was a lump in her throat and she felt like she could vomit. It was lucky she skipped breakfast as if she didn't she probably would have puked.

Brianna stood up, brushed off her clothes and started the long walk back. The ensuing thought _it will be harder the longer you procrastinate_ caused her to begin running. She was back within minutes and scanning the lake for a certain Sam Temple. Squinting through the sunlight she could barely make out the _lake__-_ let alone distinguish one person from another, so when she finally spied Sam, he was already walking towards her.

'Hey Breeze.' he greeted her, his tone friendly.

'Hey. You spoke to Edilio?' she replied, incapable of restraining the question threatening to burst open her skull.

'Yeah. He took it well. He said he understands if you don't wanna talk about it but he has experience with this kinda thing. Looked a bit upset though, dude's always trying to sort out problems.'

'Sorry. I should have told you not to tell him, he had enough to worry about without some pathetic girl who is so weak she took to cutting herself. He probably hates me for burdening him with my stupid problems. Understandable really.' Brianna apologised fervently, feeling awful for giving Edilio yet _more_ issues to deal with- _how selfish of her!_

Sam looked bewildered. 'You're sorry? You have nothing to be sorry for! I was the one that told Edilio!'

'And if I'd just been careful and discreet, neither of you would have to deal with this. I'm sorry to both of you. I cause so much trouble here with my stupidity I should just kill myself!'

'_Never _say that! _Ever_! Please don't kill yourself, this is _not _your fault. If I didn't want to help you, I wouldn't. You're not stupid at all! And you know what?'

'What?' she asked.

Sam took a deep breath, nervous, then looked her dead in the eye and whispered- 'I'm falling in love with you.'

Brianna was shocked? How could anyone love _her_? And Sam of all people! Whom she'd always had underlying feelings for! What did she say now? Was there really a response that did justice to such a beautiful sentence? Her mind jumping for joy, the corners of her mouth tugged upwards until she was grinning elatedly. Sam stepped forward and wrapped his arms around her tiny waist, neither of them caring that at least 20 people were watching them. And then he was kissing her. And she was kissing him back. And they were the only people who existed, in their little bubble of joy. _Everything would be just fine as long as she was with him._


	6. Should I continue?

**Hey guys, I'm thinking of stopping with this story. Not many people are reading past the first chapter and I don't know if it's any good. _Please _leave a review telling me whether you want me to delete. I just don't think anyone is reading and enjoying it.**

**Also, I don't have a lot of time- I go to a strict school where I get lots of homework and in my spare time I am training for a cycle race. That means if I decide to carry on I won't update as much as I did before.**

**Thanks.**


End file.
